Wendens Ambo arrived at Sawston knowing that a bonus point victory for the home team would secure the league championship for the South Cambridgeshire side – so a fierce contest was inevitable.

So it proved to be: Wendens took on their neighbours and rivals in a set of fiercely contested forward exchanges and succeeded in putting the well-drilled league leaders off their stride for much of the game. The mathc remained scoreless for twenty minutes with numerous breakdowns in play and evenly contest scrums and line outs meaning that the visitors were able to battle the hosts to a standstill. Particularly prominent was Harry Sibbbald, playing his first game for a number of weeks, who carried the ball effectively and Tony Walling who brought all his experience to bear to marshal the troops from Scrum Half.

There was a sense of inevitability though when Sawston were able to get the ball wide and strong running and safe handling were able to beat the Wendens defence out wide for the opening score. A second swiftly followed, but there was to be no opening of the floodgates. Wendens remained on the attack and intensive defensive pressure led to an interception as the Sawston three-quarters rashly attempted an ambitious offload – only to find the waiting Wendens back row who ran in for a score under the posts.

A third try for Sawston before half time saw the interval score as 19-7 to the hosts and the league title perhaps only one try away.

The second half saw more fiercely contested ball and the home side at times seemed ill at ease with each other and a period of Wendens pressure at the start of the second half began to threaten an upset. But it was not to be … a well worked turnover saw the Sawston forwards gain ground before some excellent support running saw the play go from Sawston’s line to Wendens and a try under the posts to secure the bonus point. This took the wind from Wendens sails and two further tries were scored before, on the last play of the match, GB Thake was able to barrel over from short range to bring the final score to 34-14.

A well fought game, enjoyed by all, before an appreciative audience was followed by a sociable evening as the two sides were able to compare their own performance with those of the Six Nations players – all agreed that Messrs Hogg, Vunipola and Hartley would enjoy the experience of winning the Eastern Counties 3 league just as much as their international exploits.

Wendens Ambo

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